Africa Climate Change Fund launches second call for proposals

Grants of US $ 250,000 – US $ 1 million to scale-up access to climate finance and to support climate resilient, low carbon development in African countries

The Africa Climate Change Fund (ACCF), housed in the Climate Change and Green Growth Department of the African Development Bank (AfDB), is launching a call for proposals.

The funding envelope available for this call is US $5 million in the form of grants. The Fund is seeking concept notes for projects and programmes in the range of US $250,000 – US $ 1 million.

Focus Areas and themes:

The ACCF is seeking innovative and impactful proposals that will support African countries to transition to climate resilient, low carbon development, and scale-up access to climate finance. Priority will be given to proposals focused on the thematic areas: supporting direct access to climate finance; and supporting small–scale or pilot adaptation initiatives to build resilience of vulnerable communities.

Proposals should be aligned with the priorities of the Bank, including the 10-year strategy (which aims for inclusive growth and a transition to green growth) and the High-Five priorities (which aim to light up and power Africa, feed Africa, industrialize Africa, integrate Africa, and improve the quality of life for the people of Africa), as well as with the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and the National Adaptation Plans (NAPs) or related adaptation strategies of the beneficiary countries.

Eligible beneficiaries:

This call for proposals is open to all eligible beneficiaries of the ACCF, including African governments, regional organizations, funds, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and research institutions, as well as Bank departments. Proposals from consortia are allowed, as long as all members of the consortium are eligible beneficiaries.

The African Climate Change Fund (ACCF) was created by the African Development Bank in April 2014 with an initial contribution of € 4.725 million from the government of Germany to support African countries in building their resilience to the negative impacts of climate change and in transitioning to sustainable low-carbon growth.

The ACCF secured an additional funding commitment of € 4.7 million from the government of Italy at the end of 2015 and a commitment of € 2 million from the government of Flanders, Belgium in 2016, bringing the total contributions to the ACCF since its inception to over € 11.4 million. These commitments have allowed the ACCF to scale-up to a multi-donor trust fund.

To date, the ACCF has approved 8 small grant projects for a total of US $3.3 million. The approved projects are supporting six countries (Mali, Kenya, Swaziland, Cabo Verde, Zanzibar (Tanzania) and Cote d’Ivoire) to strengthen their capacities to access international climate finance, as well as two multi-national projects.